Talking Student Engagement with Dr. Diane Neubauer and AnneMarie Chase

This week on Growing with Proficiency The Podcast, episode 90 is an in-person episode from the CI Mitten conference. Dr. Diane Neubauer and AnneMarie Chase joined me to talk about the multifaceted concept of student engagement in the world language classroom.

In our discussion, we uncover and challenge traditional views of engagement, offering innovative strategies and real-life applications that will inspire and empower educators.

This post will highlight the conversation I had with Dr. Diane Neubauer and AnneMarie Chase. To hear all of the details and our full conversation, listen above or here.

What is Student Engagement?

During this time of year, we usually see a decline in engagement in our classes, and it’s important to discuss what to do when this occurs, especially in world language classes. 

Since many of us could have different understandings of the word ‘engagement’, we started our conversation off by answering the question, what is engagement?

Diane discussed her PhD research on student engagement in a language class. In her study, student engagement referred to all aspects of student involvement during moments of target language topic development. She explained that involvement included not only their talk but also involvement through text use, writing gestures, and other behaviors that show responsiveness to, and involvement in, the interaction.

Engagement includes four areas: cognitive, emotional, social, and behavioral dimensions. Diane went on to explain these four areas and provided examples of each. Listen here to hear her explanation.

Innovative Strategies for Engagement

It’s important to remember that if your students don’t react like you think they should, it doesn’t mean they aren’t engaged. For example, sometimes I feel that an activity did not produce the engagement I thought it would with my students, however, when I ask them as they leave class to tell me something about class, they mention that they liked that same activity I was worried about.

Silence from our students usually means that our students aren’t engaged. But, that’s not always the case. We have to remember that we have many personalities in our class, and not everyone displays engagement in the same way. 

Small whiteboards, or paper, can be used by students to engage in class without speaking. Students can also do a thumbs up or thumbs down to communicate with you their understanding. 

Anne Marie Chase also shares in episode 90 effective techniques for increasing student involvement, including physical activities, gamification, and novel games tailored for end-of-year excitement

Practical Ideas for the End of the Year

“Centric Circles” for Student Engagement

This oral assessment is a great way to celebrate progress and foster a low-stress environment where students can express themselves freely. This is what AnneMarie uses to assess speaking in class. 

In Centric Circles, the teacher displays different prompts for one to two minutes each. With each prompt, one student shares about that prompt in the target language while another student acts like a coach. Then, the next prompt is used in the same way.

Scavenger Hunt with Pictures

For this activity, different pictures that were discussed with the class during the year are gathered together. Then, the teacher writes descriptions for each picture and creates a handout with those descriptions. Next, the teacher hangs the pictures up in a random order in one general area. It’s fun to do this activity outside.

Working in pairs with their handouts, students find the pictures described and write the expression that is below the picture. This expression will ensure that they found the right picture. 

“Movie Talk” for Student Engagement

Movie Talk is a strategy to enhance comprehension and engagement through narrated movie scenes, ideal for end-of-year learning. Diane shared this activity with us, one that she presented on at the conference. Movie Talk was coined by Dr. Ashley Hastings.

Movie Talk is different than Clip Talk. With this activity, the entire movie is used. Instead of trying to make all of the dialogues comprehensible, the teacher narrates the movie in comprehensible target language. So, there is not a constant stop-rewind-play happening because the teacher is describing what they see instead.

Episode 90 serves as a toolkit for educators aiming to enhance engagement in their classrooms through thoughtful, innovative, and practical strategies that resonate with both students and teachers alike. Listen to our full discussion and all of the strategies on episode 90 here.